Monthly archives of “April 2017”

Ah the banlieue, city of fluorescent lights in drab office buildings, mercury vapor lights in the courtyards of the projects, police flashlights shining on dark faces. I just watched Sciamma’s movie, and it led me to go back to Kassovitz’s, which I hadn’t seen since it came out — more than twenty years ago now! While Girlhood is pretty depressing (though not depressing enough; see below), I have to say that if we’re getting our news solely from these two movies, things seem to be a bit less dire in 2014 than they were in 1995.

There’s good reason not to trust that narrative, though; both of these films about the experiences of poor French of color from the projects by les honkies from film school. Be that as it may. If you categorically disapprove of privileged people writing disadvantaged characters, you’ll want to skip both these movies.

Sciamma creates a convincing world for a while, but then starts exoticizing and goes off the rails. She’s so enraptured by the beauty of these girls as they work their hustles and dance and party and catfight that she forgets to show us just how truly dangerous and dire their situations really are. A black teenager living on her own dealing drugs at street level is going to get hurt, and this movie’s fantasy that she’ll instead turn into some kind of inspired and empowered super hero is, in my view, irresponsible. But maybe I’m being too rough; check it out for yourself. And remember to watch Kassovitz’s movie, too, if you’ve never seen it. It’s like if Spike Lee was French. Sort of.

I haven’t seen anything from Tykwer since The International (2009); I stayed away from Cloud Atlas (2012) because I liked the book too much to chance ruining it. This movie is in the classic Tykwer manner, both firmly pegged to reality and subtly fantastical. It’s small and quiet but quite beautiful. The sequence of Tom Hanks wandering the half-finished building projects in the Saudi desert should be read in tandem with the scene of Adela Quested in the Marabar caves. Our so-called global culture has a single god, Misunderstanding, and the Dollar is his prophet. The love story here is a total cop out and utter bullshit (which is also classic Tykwer), but since the love interest is Sarita Choudhury, all is forgiven.

P.S. One night in the early 90’s I slept in Sarita Choudhury’s bed. She wasn’t home; her roommate let me crash there. I tell this story every chance I get.